Empowerment and Change
In ideal cases, "the bicycle has removed a barrier in their life," paving the way for success.
To look at Portland from the point of view of the Community Cycling Center, there's nothing that a pair of tires and a bike frame can't fix.
That feisty notion is the hallmark of the center, which targets both adults and children with hands-on ridership programs, volunteer projects and a neighborhood bike shop. All bolster a core message: Bikes aren't just a means of transportation, but vehicles for empowerment and change.
Focused on removing barriers to cycling, among the center's many endeavors is a program that pairs bikes and gear with people who need something else: jobs. Through Create a Commuter, the Community Cycling Center teams with 13 local employment programs to make sure participating job seekers can to get to interviews and commute to and from the jobs they land.
Employment agencies targeting low-income Portlanders, Native Americans, the disabled, homeless youths, refugees, college students and also the recently incarcerated are included in the mix.
"We basically screen agencies on their success rate of getting people jobs," says Zan Gibbs, adult program manager.
A Cycling Center team then rolls up to partner locations in a delivery truck, toting bikes custom fit to each rider, plus locks, lights, helmets and other essentials, such as maps.
"We take them out on rides during the class," says Gibbs, providing participants with basic instruction on riding, safety, injury prevention and route-planning.
The program gets good results, from making riders of people who have never ridden a bike, to creating unlikely bike commuters out of job seekers and students facing long bus commutes or financial hardship (50 percent earn less than $200 a month).
One new commuter said owning a bike enabled him to see more of his son. A group of former convicts formed a riding team to travel from work at 2 a.m., at the end of their new shifts at a bakery. One participant became so enamored with cycling that he began leading rides for children at New Columbia, a low-income community.
That's just a snippet of outcomes from a productive year. Create a Commuter put 173 new or refurbished bikes into the hands of adults in 2010. Each also got a five-hour course in skills, along with gear essential for hitting the road. After 60 days, 43 percent of riders said they were using bikes to get to work, with 27 percent still riding to interviews. Riders also used their bikes to run errands, get to school, attend church, exercise or head to meetings. Sixty-two percent said they also rode their bikes just for fun.
In ideal cases, "the bicycle has removed a barrier in their life," says Gibbs, paving the way for people's success, whether they're looking for a new job or learning how to navigate a new country.
From inside its funky bike shop on Northeast Alberta Street in Portland, it's hard to tell the Community Cycling Center has such a profound impact on marginalized Portlanders. The shop got its start as a riding and repair school for local kids. It's now a bustling nonprofit, with more than 30 employees and 1,000 volunteers.
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